


Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep

by Fenix21



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Bedtime Stories, Big Brother!Dean, Episode: s05e21 Two Minutes to Midnight, Fluff, Gen, Guilt, Revelations, angel's don't sleep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-29
Updated: 2016-07-10
Packaged: 2018-07-18 23:27:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7335280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fenix21/pseuds/Fenix21
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean has decided Cas needs to get some sleep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I took a little liberty with the episode timing in order to squeeze this in between the boys killing Pestilence and Dean going after Death.
> 
> A/N a note of thanks to Lochinvar for previewing chapter 2 and assuring me that it was not a nonsensical mess, so I could post it :)

‘Dude, get some sleep,’ Dean said, tossing the corner of a blanket over Cas’ thigh as he passed on his way to drop into Bobby’s beat up recliner. He still had his boots on and his flannel shirt. He kicked up the foot rest and crossed his arms over his chest, deliberately closing his eyes. 

Cas shifted upward from his slouch on the sofa. He picked at the corner of the blanket. ‘I am fine.’

Dean blew out between his lips, the corners pulling down in a sardonic smirk, but he didn’t open his eyes. ‘I’ve heard that before.’ He settled a little deeper into the recliner’s frayed cushions. ‘Sleep. You’re gonna need it, and we’ve only got a couple hours.’

Cas made another attempt to straighten up. He was sore from head to heels. His whole body felt heavy, heavier than Earth’s current gravity could account for, and there was a strange persistent pounding in his head that was making his skull feel smaller and smaller. He thought maybe it was a headache, but he’d never had one so he couldn’t be sure. His eyes, too, felt dry and gritty, as if he’d been standing unprotected in a Mesopotamian sandstorm, and no matter how many times he blinked, he couldn’t clear the blur from his vision.

‘Cas. I’m serious. Get some shut-eye,’ Dean said again, but he cracked an eye this time to look over at the angel. ‘Cas?’

Cas swung his head around slowly, feeling his brain slosh up against the inside of his cranium. He flinched a little, blinked blearily, and lifted up the blanket to examine it like it was some foreign object whose purpose he couldn’t comprehend. 

‘Cas?’ Dean swung his feet to the floor and leaned forward, brow starting to furrow in concern.

Cas blinked owlishly at him. ‘I… I don’t know how?’

Dean scowled. ‘Don’t know how? What do you mean? You close your eyes and just…sleep. It’s not hard.’ Cas continued to look at him, a little dazed. Dean shook his head and pushed out of the chair with a grunt and a mumbled, ‘Oh for the love of…’

He took hold of Cas’ shoulders and pushed him over sideways on the sofa. The angel went with little resistance, head bouncing against the arm. He flinched again at the thing he thought was pain as his brain sloshed to the other side, and Dean offered a gruff ‘sorry.’ Dean proceeded to tug the blanket up around his shoulders, and then paused, looking down at him with an expression Cas had no hope of reading. 

Human expressions were so varied and so often flowed one into the other with very little distinction between that Cas doubted he would ever master reading them. He had a few of Dean’s committed to memory. Anger, because he wore that one the most recently. Happiness. That one was extremely rare, and Cas couldn’t recall the last he’d seen it. Fear was another one, but Dean only wore it when Sam was in danger. He never seemed to care for himself in regards to danger. It apparently never occurred to him to fear for his own well-being or safety. 

The expression on Dean’s face now was so muddled, Cas could barely pick anything out of it. He thought there was regret, maybe. Frustration, perhaps, and that was likely since Dean was exhausted himself and didn’t need to be trying to explain how to sleep to a broken angel. There was something else there as well, masked expertly by all the rest, and Cas imagined the only reason he could glimpse it now was because of Dean’s intense exhaustion. He didn’t have a name for it—wondered if there even was a name. It looked a little like something he had seen in Dean’s eyes, less and less now days, when he looked at Sam when Sam wasn’t looking at him, before the hurt came up to quell it and wash it away.

‘Just. Close your eyes, Cas. Take a couple of deep breaths and relax,’ Dean was saying, and Cas tried dutifully to refocus his attention on the task at hand and closed his eyes. He took several deep, slow breaths and waited.

Dean straightened up but didn’t move away and Cas lay very still, focusing on the dark behind his lids and his even breathing. The pounding in his head was making it a little difficult to concentrate, and being bent at this odd angle with his feet still on the floor but the upper half of him lying down was rather uncomfortable, but he did try since Dean deemed it of such importance that he master this.

Suddenly he felt his legs lifted and straightened, and the pinching sensation over his hip released. He sighed unconsciously.

‘Better?’

Cas blinked. Dean was still standing over him, hands shoved in his back pockets. He nodded once and then closed his eyes again and resumed his breathing practice. He heard Dean shuffle to the chair and then the sound of it being dragged a little over the hardwood floor. Then there was the protesting creak of hinges and joints as Dean sank back into it. Cas continued to lay still and stare at the blackness behind his lids. He thought he was making good progress when he felt a heavy hand on his chest and Dean said, whisper-rough,

'You're tryin' too hard. Just let it happen.'

Cas took another deep breath and held it. He didn't really need to breathe, even now. He was still an angel, just an angel without any power, his grace strung out, drained and weakened. Perhaps because he had been disobedient to his purpose. He had doubted, and his Father had cast him down for his lack of faith.

'Cas?'

He opened his eyes wide and turned to look at Dean. He was sitting forward in the chair again, and Cas could recognize this expression as well—it was worry.  He frowned, unable to detect the source of this emotion. 'Dean?'

Dean got up out of the chair and sat down on the very edge of the sofa, really just leaning his hip on it while he squatted down and took hold of Cas' arms, rubbing them a little through his trench coat. 

'Man, are you cold or somethin'? I didn't think angels got cold.'

'We don't,' Cas said vaguely. 'We don't sleep either.'

Dean stilled his hands, and it was then that Cas realized he was trembling. He held his own hands up in front of his face to examine them. It wasn't bad, only a fine tremor, but it seemed to pervade his whole body, traveling across the structure of his bones. It had never happened to him before. He couldn't feel that he was cold. It didn't make sense that he would be, inside like he was, still in his trench coat, wrapped up in the admittedly threadbare, but still woolen and warm, blanket. Dean resumed his rubbing, more slowly this time.

'Well, then I'd say you're due a nap, Cas. You're shakin' like Sam comin' off one of his highs.'

Cas frowned at Dean's forced bark of laughter at the end of that thought. 'I have not been drinking any demon blood.'

'No, I know—' Dean stopped, shook his head. 'Never mind.' 

He made to stand up again, but Cas reached out and caught his wrist. 'You should not make jokes at his expense, Dean.'

Dean's eyes flashed wide, then he blushed and looked away. 'I know. I didn't mean… Hey, since when were you in his corner, anyway?'

Cas shrugged. It made his neck twinge and his head hurt. Dean reached to rub at the juncture of his neck and shoulder. Cas felt a knot of muscles start to release under his strong fingers.

'Dude, you are a mess of knots. Didn't you ever get some hot Egyptian chick to give you a massage in all your two thousand years on Earth?'

'I have been here for many more than two thousand years, Dean,' Cas corrected. Dean rolled his eyes and kept working at the knot. 

Cas studied him openly while he worked a thumb under his shirt collar to get at bare skin. He shivered again, but Dean didn't seem to notice. Cas' hand was still wrapped around Dean's other wist and he absently brushed his thumb back and forth over the protruding bone. Dean's hands were strong. They were a fine example of his Father's work both in structure and use. There was blood and ash and dirt buried under Dean's nails, probably from years ago that had never come clean—it was so hard to wash off death and evil, especially when you lived elbow deep in it every day like Sam and Dean did—but they were still lovely. Long fingers, a couple of them slightly crooked from long ago breaks that had never been set correctly, broad palms built up with callouses from shovel handles and the butts of guns, but they were still warm.

'He is an abomination and renounced by Heaven, but I have grown…fond of him.'

Dean halted his impromptu massage and scowled at Cas, having lost the previous thread of conversation. 'Huh?'

'Sam,' Cas supplied. 'I have grown fond of him. After all, it is obvious he loves you with an intensity of which a creature of pure evil could not possibly be capable, and you return this love. I have found over our short time together, that you are an excellent judge of character, therefore I have given him the…benefit of the doubt? And found that I am truly fond of him, even if his intentions have been misguided at times.'

Dean sat back. 'Oh.'

They stared at one another in silence for a moment. 

'You good now?' Dean asked.

Cas tentatively rolled a shoulder. It did feel better, but it was only one small ache among all the rest, and he was no closer to being able to sleep now than he had been half an hour ago.

'You need me to read you a bedtime story?' Dean quipped.

Cas stared. 'Yes.'

Dean stared back, jaw gone slack. 'I was kidding, Cas. Jesus. I am not gonna—' He stopped mid-sentence, peering closely at Cas and frowning a little, like he was trying to figure something out. He finally sighed in a very put upon fashion. 'I do not believe I am doin' this…'

He gripped Cas by his coat and shirt and hauled him up so there was enough room for Dean to squish in between him and the arm of the couch. Cas maneuvered himself until he was leaning mostly against the couch back and the side of Dean's shoulder. Dean slouched down, grabbed a pillow and wrapped his arms around it against his chest and tipped his head back, closing his eyes. Cas watched him for a few seconds and then mimicked him in closing his eyes and tipping his head back.

'You know,' Dean started slowly. 'Sam had a spell when he was six or so—wouldn't go to sleep without a story. He wasn't loud about it, never threw a fit or anything, just wouldn't go to sleep. Dad said I was coddling him and fostering a bad habit giving in like I did, but Sammy was just so damn stubborn sometimes…'

Cas flicked his eyes open long enough to catch the pinch at the corners of Dean's mouth as it pressed momentarily into a thin, hard line. 'Tell me about him,' he said quietly.

'About Sam? What's to tell? You've been around for the last couple years. You know 'im.'

'You love him.'

Dean blew out a breath. ''Course I love him. He's my brother.'

'Dean. You sold your soul for him.'

'He's my _brother_ ,' Dean repeated. 'Who wouldn't have?'

Cas considered for a second. 'I cannot say. I have brothers, but I am not human, and I do not understand the drives that cause you to feel as you do.'

'Yeah, well…' Cas watched Dean gnaw on his bottom lip for a few moments, then he said, 'Close your damn eyes, or you're going to sleep on your own.'

Cas obediently closed his eyes and did not remind Dean again that angels, even broken ones, did not sleep. Dean was silent again for a long stretch, and Cas thought maybe _he_ had fallen asleep. So much the better, as Dean was merely human and at the point of exhaustion both mentally and physically. He deserved rest, real rest, not just the paltry couple of hours they had left of this night. 

'He was beautiful,' Dean whispered. 'Just…beautiful. He was a beautiful baby and a beautiful boy, and a beautiful teenager, even if I did want to beat his damn ass half the time for his stubborn bull-headedness. He was a good kid. As bad as you've seen him get? He was twice that good. He had a heart like… It was huge. He wanted to save the whole world, but not by killin' things. He wasn't made that way. And he was smart. I mean, _really_ smart. I knew he was goin' places. I knew he was better than this life. I knew he didn't want it, and he had the potential to be…so much more.'

'He's still with us, Dean,' Cas said very quietly, drawing Dean's attention to his use of the past tense as he spoke of his brother. 

'I know,' Dean rasped. He swallowed audibly and and struggled to keep his breathing even. 'I just wish…'

Cas worked his hand from beneath the blanket and pushed it between the pillow Dean held against him and his chest, felt for the steady pound of his heart, and wished with all his might that there was one last ember of power somewhere inside him that he could use to ease Dean's pain. 

'One of Sam's favorite stories,' Dean continued, voice rough and thick with tender memories, 'was the one I told him when he asked me about the stars, why they were there, what they were for. I told him they were where all the greatest heroes went when their jobs were done, and that they stayed there in the sky, watching, until they might be needed again.

'I told him about two brother's, Perseus and Orion. I'd heard the names at school in some class, and showed him where their shapes were in the night sky. I told him they used to travel the world and all the seas, saving people from dragons and monsters, just like us, and that one day after our jobs were done, we would be sent up to the stars, too, to wait and watch until we were needed again.'

Cas listened to the sound of Dean's voice through the vibration in his chest as he spoke. It felt tingly against his hand, like it had a power and energy all its own, and it worked its way up his arm and into his tired, battered body and started to soothe the aches. The darkness behind his eyelids started to take form and tiny pinpricks of light appeared and stretched out and out like they went on forever.

Dean laughed softly. It was a very sad and weary sound. 'Even after Sammy got old enough to know that my story was just a bunch of bullshit, and learned in school who Perseus and Orion really were and what stars were actually made of, he still asked me to tell it when Dad was gone for just a little too long. When he was afraid.'

Dean's voice was growing softer, as if it was coming across an ever increasing distance, and Cas felt very light, like he was being lifted up into the stars coalescing behind his closed eyes. His body felt boundless, like he was no longer wholly contained in it, a thought that should have worried him as his true form would mean instant destruction for anyone near him, but he was so comfortable he couldn't bring himself to be concerned over it.

He let himself drift, and just before sleep overcame him, he heard Dean say softly, 'Sweet dreams, Cas,' and felt one of those broad, perfectly formed hands, that had worked his Father's will, however unintentionally, at such great personal cost, come to rest over his own. Their fingers slotted together easily, and Cas' last thought was how very strong Dean's heart was in its capacity to love even when it was betrayed and beaten and broken by the object of its greatest affection; and to wonder… if man was made in God's image, why had God not been able to love all his children? Even those with flaws.


	2. Chapter 2

It turned out angels could sleep, whether or not they _did_ , and they snored.

Dean nudged at Cas until the angel's head rolled loosely from the couch back to rest on Dean's shoulder and the snoring ceased with his change in position. He readjusted the pillow against his chest, unconsciously pressing Cas' hand closer. The angel's skin was cool, cooler than Dean had thought it would be given the scorched handprint emblazoned on his shoulder—the shoulder Cas was now leaning against, in fact. He wondered if he moved his fingers the couple of inches to the angel's wrist, if he would be able to find a pulse. Was there a beating heart still in that chest? He knew the host's body had one, but Jimmy was long since dead. So, did Cas need it to beat to sustain the body he wore, or did he keep it beating for sentimental reasons, or because he'd grown so close to humans ( _one in particular_ , a whisper in the back of Dean's mind reminded him) did he believe they were more comfortable if they could feel that steady rhythm as proof of life.

And if the heart beat, could it feel?

Dean's eyes snapped open and he stared at the ceiling, a little short of breath.  Did it matter if the angel could feel? What the hell _did_ it matter?

On the subject of hearts, Dean's was pounding behind his ribs. It was a wonder the fierce throb didn't reach Castiel in his sleep and cause him to wake. It was certainly loud enough, at least in Dean's ears. The rush of his blood was like the morning tide crashing at a rocky shore. He made to move, before he did wake Cas, but the angel made a sound in his sleep, whispery and content, and Dean's heart paused to hear it. 

He let out a slow breath, settled back further into the cushions and deliberately closed his eyes again. Cas made no further sound, and Dean sat perfectly still.

Surely, he must feel something. Heart or no heart. He'd been recalled to Heaven because his superiors felt he was becoming too involved, too _attached_. That took feelings of one sort or another. It took feelings, too, to beat the living shit out of him in that alley when he'd been so willing to sell his ass to Michael so they could take home the trophy on this one. He wondered what Cas would name those feelings, if he even could, and if they at all mirrored Dean's.

He shied away from thinking too much about how Cas had infiltrated his heart. He'd never thought there was enough room in it for more than Sam, but he was beginning to wonder if he had just sized it to fit his little brother, because loving was a painful and dangerous thing, and Dean couldn't afford—or maybe even survive—more than what he felt for Sam. Cas had found a corner, though, and he was making room for himself in fits and starts. 

Dean could remember being afraid first (though he didn't want to admit it) but awed, too. In the beginning he figured it was one of those psychological complexes Sam would have found in one of his college books where the rescued falls in love with the rescuer; and even now, Dean was a far cry from calling anything love, but someone somewhere had once told him it was impossible to hate something you hadn't loved at some point, and he'd felt that for Cas. He'd hated him, on a level so deep it might sit with him forever, because of the splinter of uncertainty he'd forced between him and Sam. 

Nothing had lit Dean's blood on fire faster than hearing the word 'abomination' pass the angel's lips while he glared at Dean's baby brother with something that bordered on disgust. Dean still couldn't reconcile it completely in his head, how he could love them both at the same time. He couldn't deny it, though, either. 

He slid his fingers more firmly between Cas' and squeezed lightly. The angel didn't respond, just slept on, and Dean wondered when this was all over, if he would stay; or if he would go back to Heaven; or if there would even be a Heaven for him to go back to. If this played out and the Devil went down, then Dean would be alone. Most of his heart would be gutted, emptied out, void and barren, and in need of something to keep it from crumbling to dust. He thought maybe if Cas were to hang around…

Though it wasn't fair to ask that, not of an angel, not even of a man. To ask someone to fill in for Sam would be like asking a stream to fill an ocean bed. There wasn't enough there. Could never be enough there to fill the space that Sam would leave.

Dean blew out another breath, felt a familiar tightness in his chest and hot trails of tears leaking from the corners of his eyes. Jesus. It'd been forever since he'd cried. He hadn't permitted himself that kind release for…longer than he could recall. His heart stuttered under his and Cas' interlocked hands, and he held his breath for a minute not wanting the angel to wake at his distress. 

But Cas slept on, and after a few minutes, Dean felt himself drifting into a light doze. His head lolled to the side, and he felt soft, cool, silken strands catch in the stubble of his jaw and his cheek came to rest on top of Cas' head. 

'Sammy…' he breathed, but the scent was wrong, and Cas wasn't warm like Sam was. He breathed in, caught the scent of ocean and forrest, the passage of time etched in the striations of the earth. In his mind, he heard the beating of wings. 'Castiel.'

He shivered at the cold, harsh light that filled him at the name, wondered briefly if this was what Cas looked like in his true form, then he felt warmth cocoon him. He pried his eyes open for a heartbeat and saw a bleary shadow loom above him, broad shouldered, lanky for all its bulk, and shaggy hair.

'Should be…sleepin', Sammy,' Dean mumbled as his eyes slipped closed again.

'Shh, Dean,' Sam whispered close by, and Dean felt the too long missed warmth of his boyish smile just before he felt dry lips brush across his brow and a hand smooth through his hair.

'Rest,' Sam said.

Dean wanted to catch at that warmth before it drifted way, but his limbs were sodden with sleep and the weight at his side was too perfect to move just now, so he slurred a sleepy,

'Love you…Sam.'

There was a soft huff of breath at his cheek, a laugh maybe, but not without its sadness, its regret. Another hand smoothed his hair back, cupped the back of his neck, thumbed gently at the bolt of his jaw. 'You, too, big brother. Now. Sleep. For tomorrow, it is the stars for us.'

Dean felt more tears behind his closed lids, parted his lips on a ragged breath of grief, and felt it kissed away, chaste and pure, like Sam had done when he was still too young to speak his love. 

'Forever,' Dean whispered. 'We'll be…'till forever.'


End file.
